Friday, October 14, 2011

When we last left Anastasia Steele and Christian Grey, they were reeling from the ruin of their relationship, if that's what you call it. Luckily, that issue is resolved fairly quickly into Fifty Shades Darker. Our lovebirds quickly get back into the swing of things.

Christian starts to open up to Anastasia realizing that he may have to relax some of his boundaries to keep her around. Anastasia veers between trying not to be disturbed by Christian's desires while still maintaining her own boundaries. The issue starts to come to a head when one of Christian's past lovers starts stalking them and eventually confronts Anastasia. The crises causes Anastasia's doubts about her ability to satisfy Christian to resurface. As she continues to be confronted by evidence of his past, she is plagued by worry about their future in light of Christian's needs. Add the introduction of "Mrs. Robinson" and this girl is dealing with tons of drama due to her relationship with Christian. When she realizes Christian is extending himself to meet her halfway, she makes some concessions of her own that make him very happy!

That E. L. James was able to continue this story in an interesting way is a testament to her skill as a writer. It would have been easy to make this book a rerun of the first book but by furthering the character's back stories and continuing to deepen her characters and their relationships to each other, E. L. was able to add to the original story. And it just as steamy as the first book. If you liked Fifty Shades of Grey, you will like Fifty Shades Darker.

*This book was provided by the publisher in exchange for my honest opinion*

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

One of my favorite authors as a teenager was Christopher Pike. I read all the books and requested some of my first inter-library loans to get my hands on his books. Remember Me, The Last Vampire series (I thought I had read every one bit apparently he's released two more books since 2010), Sati, and The Cold One. His books were totally delicious - creepy spine-tinglers that had plot but weren't babyish. His characters get into typical adolescent shenanigans as well as way more serious activities. I probably wouldn't read him now but his books were perfect as a voracious teen reader. Not to mention a lot of his covers were fairly innocous so it was pretty easy to disguise what you were reading.